Bus Plummets Off Cliff in Central Mexico

Published 7:00 pm, Sunday, January 5, 2003

A bus with failing brakes swerved off a mountain highway and into a deep ravine in Zacatecas state, killing 18 people and injuring 23 others.

The bus was carrying a driver and 40 passengers from Tlaltenango down a two-lane highway en route to the town of Jalapa, said Hector Cortez, a Zacatecas state spokesman.

Just before 10 a.m. Monday, driver Gustavo Perez tried to steer his aging bus around a sharp curve when the vehicle's brakes failed, causing the bus to careen off the road and topple into a 750-foot valley, Cortez said.

Mexico City's Televisa television cited anonymous survivors as saying Cortez yelled that he couldn't control the bus and urged passengers to jump out of its doors and windows seconds before the vehicle skidded off the cliff. No one had time to comply, Televisa reported.

Zacatecas Gov. Ricardo Monreal was in Mexico City meeting with President Vicente Fox at the time of the crash, but sent his private helicopter to airlift the injured to hospitals in the nearby city of Los Fresnos, 330 miles northwest of Mexico City.

Another two passengers were flown to a hospital in Guadalajara, Mexico's second-largest city, according to the Zacatecas government's statement.

Monreal called the accident "deeply sad and tragic."

Those killed included eight men, eight women and two children, Castro said. Everyone else on board the bus was injured and 12 of them were in critical condition late Monday night, he said.

Because authorities believe the crash was caused by mechanical failure, Castro said prosecutors had no plans to file criminal charges against the driver.